Milestones

Yep, we're up close and personal today!

Over the past few weeks, Em has hit a few milestones.  It started with this:

In her usual deadpan, unexpressive manner, Em told me that her tooth fell out when she bit into her carrot.  I think I was more excited than she was.  She has since lost her second bottom tooth.

Then a week or so later it was this:  The first day of first grade.

She has grown up so much this past year!!!

Then just yesterday was another milestone.  

One of our summer goals was to teach Em to ride her bike.  She has felt quite trepidatious about the whole ordeal.  To make it worse, C has been basically riding circles around Em on her balance bike. She has no fear and loves to go up and down hills, in the grass, where ever.  If you're just starting a child out on a bike… I can't stress enough to go the balance bike route!!!  Em did not have a balance bike but C does, and it has made a world of difference!   It's also been a hard go because Ben doesn't get home until late and we've had something almost every weekend.  So, it has principally been me who has taught her to ride.  She finally got to the point where she could ride and balance just fine.  The trick has been to get her to branch out of our little parking lot and also to start on her own without having to be pushed.

So yesterday, we finally had an open day and we took our bikes to Rosenstein Park… a very large park in the city.  When we arrived Em was in tears crying that she did not want to be there and she was NOT going to ride her bike.  I gave up and left Ben with her… while I took C and J for a ride.  When I circled around 45 minutes later, I found her riding on her own up a hill with a huge smile on her face.  Apparently Ben worked a miracle.  That's why you need Dads around, right?  So we rode all over the park, she was happy as can be and had no troubles stopping and starting on her own!  Yippee!

My camera was out of juice so these are the best pics we got:

So hardcore, right?

And they're off!

My favorite picture… I pulled them around for a good while like this:

Not the most flattering pic of me, but I have to show I was there… for posterity' sake!

And we hit an awesome German playground… my theory is German playgrounds double as military training facilities during the week and a children's playground on the weekends. That's C's silhouette going down the strange clear slide.

Oh, and bonus pics… J keeps me in the cultural hall all during second hour because asking him to sit still in Sacrament Meeting AND Sunday School is just pushing my luck.  So, why not do a photo shoot?